Today's headstand practice and first chest expander workout in a while

In today's headstand practice, I had a tiny, yet meaningful breakthrough. I was able to lift each knee at least half a foot from my elbow. For the first time I felt like I could use my core to not only pull my knees into the headstand, but also lift my hips so that they're closer to being stacked over my shoulders. The more active core made it easier to lift each knee. I alternated between holding the headstand as long as possible - about 20 seconds - and working on raising each knee, which shortened the hold time.

After the 10-minute headstand practice, I did ring dips for my Push session. I did 9 sets of 3 for a total of 27 reps. There was some left shoulder pain on the first set, but after I got the hang of doing a hard reverse shrug at the top of the dip, and maintaining depressed scapulae while going down into the dip, I didn't feel any more shoulder pain. I still felt some clicking in the left shoulder though.

I tried cleaning a 16kg kettlebell. I was still feeling irritation in the thumb side of my right forearm. If my forearm felt fine, I would have tried cleaning a 20kg KB, then I would have tested my 20kg clean+press rep max and planned to do The Giant next week.

In the afternoon, I did my first chest expander workout in a while. The instability of my left shoulder which led to some pain on my first attempt at parallette push ups made me think about revisiting chest expander training - especially for the pull apart drills which are said to improve shoulder stability. I did mostly the same workout shown in Alex Leonidas' video. One change I made was to do the Overhand Vertical Pullapart behind the neck, as shown in Alex's more recent video. Doing this move behind the neck feels more natural than doing it in front of the neck.

Overhand Vertical Pullapart - 1 set - 3 springs - 19 reps

Overhand Vertical Pullapart - 1 set - 2 springs - 20 reps

Underhand Vertical Pullapart - 1 sets - 3 springs - 7 reps

Underhand Vertical Pullapart - 1 sets - 2 springs - 14 reps

Horizontal Pullapart - 1 set - 2 springs - 6 reps

Mechancial drop set of Underhand Vertical Pullapart - 2 springs - 7 reps

Horizontal Pullapart (back off set) - 1 set - 1 spring - 16 reps

Bicep Curl - 2 sets - 2 springs - 15 reps/set

Tried Reverse Curl but it was too annoying for my right forearm/elbow. It's the same kind of pain that I get when cleaning a 16kg or 20kg kettlebell.

I decided to make the following changes for my training next week.

• Switch from the planche mini course to Prismatic Strength's Handstand Push Up Mini Course. The HSPU mini course is also built on the GMB method with the 5 P's; and is structured very similarly to the planche mini course, with each week containing 5 Prepare sessions, 2 Practice A sessions, 2 Practice B sessions, one Play session, one Push session, and 5 Ponder sessions. The main reason for the switch is I just want to try the HSPU mini course. The HSPU mini course has more bent-arm overhead pressing, which might carry over a wee bit more to kettlebell pressing, if anything carries over at all. In any case, today's attempts at cleaning the KB showed my forearm isn't ready to to back to doing The Giant, so the other reason I'll do the HSPU mini course is, it's a way to work on overhead pressing strength until the forearm feels good again for KB work.
• Drop the Strength Side Master Mobility program. I made it to Week 7 out of 12. I think it's a pretty good program. Any fitness program that is written for a general audience - rather than written by a coach for a specific individual - makes assumptions how quickly the trainee progresses. Week 7 of the program seems to assume that my mobility had progressed further than it actually has. The best mobility gains from this program was being able sit on the floor in straddle with straight legs for the first time in my adult life. This happened by the end of Week 2. My hip flexor mobility enjoyed the 2nd best gain. My lat and pectoral mobility didn't improve as much as I'd hoped, though those are not the reasons I'm dropping Master Mobility. Actually, the main reason is I want to make time for chest expander training.
• Do a chest expander workout 3 times a week. My left shoulder has been feeling unstable of late. I injured it years ago, and was diagnosed with possible shoulder impingement and subluxation. The chest expander pullapart exercises work the rear delts, external rotators, and upper back. to improve shoulder stability. I suspect I will get some shoulder mobility gains out of this as well.
• Practice the straddle side bend and a selection of exercises, out of the Master Mobility Pike exercises, that I think could fit with the straddle side bend in a circuit.

Planche Mini Course: 3rd Practice A session

This time for headstand practice, I focused on lifting a knee away from my elbow, per 2nd progression guidance from the StrongFirst HSPU Part 1 article. My very first attempt failed. As soon as I attempted to lift a knee, the pressure of my palms against the floor went up and the leg felt so heavy, as if it were made of lead. I stood up, off tension, and made a couple more attempts. On my 3rd or 4th attempt, I was able to lift a knee about half an inch on each side. By the end of Practice A, I was able to lift each knee an inch away from each arm - one knee at a time. This seems to work like GMB Frogger and Monkey, where I have to press my hands hard against the floor to get my feet in the air. Hopefully next time, I'll remember to press harder with my hands when I want to lift a leg into the air. I think when I can straighten one leg while maintaining a headstand, it will be a sign that I have the bent-arm stabilizing strength to shift all of my bodyweight to my hands, and lift my head off the floor. When I can do that, I can work on transition from headstand to Crow Pose

For the Push session, I did ring dips in 4-rep sets, for a total of 24 reps. I decided to do ring dips instead of parallette push ups because I thought my left shoulder would be less likely to be irritated. However the shoulder was irritated right away for the first couple of sets. I then remembered to set up for the dip with a hard anti-shrug to depress the scapulae, then keep the scapulae depressed and retracted as I sank into the dip. This helped eliminate the shoulder irritation. The other cue I had to remember was to not allow my elbows to flare outside my hands.

I was able to maintain the headstand, while playing with raising one leg at a time, for about 5 seconds before I had to take a break. I didn't count how many times I did the headstand within Practice A's 10 minutes, because the goal of a Practice session under the GMB 5P framework is to... practice... a skill, not chase numbers.

Planche Mini Course: 2nd Practice A session

This video from the article Your Journey to a Handstand Push-up: Part 1 by Karen Smith on the StrongFirst site inspired me to try something a little different with my headstand:



I didn't do exactly the same movement as shown in the above video. I still started on my hands and knees instead of lying on my belly. What I did incorporate from the video was contract the muscles of my core to pull my knees towards my elbows. This feels more stable than just lifting a knee to the elbow without the core engagement. I wore socks to make it easier for the feet to slide across the floor.

I asked Eduardo Orihuela if I should start working on transition to Crow Pose right away, or work on a longer headstand hold first. His reply was You can experiment with it either way. There’s no one specific way to go about it. It’s about having fun and developing control

For this session I tried to focus as much of my weight as possible on my hands, working towards removing so much weight from head that I could lift my head off the floor. Once I can lift my head off the floor, I should be ready to transition from headstand to Crow Pose. I managed to hold the headstand for about 5 seconds, at best, before my hands fatigued. Thus I spent the 10 minutes of Practice A doing multiple sets of 3-5 sec. holds.
The Play session focused on practicing the Frogger while sliding the feet slowly and stalling with the feet in the air if possible. I managed to stall with the feet in the air on a couple of reps in the first set. Pushing hard with the arms seems to be key to the stall. For the 2nd set, I tried doing the same thing but in what GMB calls the Baby Frogger - which is the Frogger with legs inside of the arms. It's harder to stall in Baby Frogger because the legs don't get to rest on the arms like in regular Frogger. I switched back to regular Frogger for the last 2 sets, thus calling it a day after 4 total sets.


Every training session in the mini course includes Prepare and Ponder sessions. Writing about my training experience is a Ponder session. After my first Practice A session last week, the back of my neck was sore for the rest of the day. I then studied this video:



This yoga teacher recommends taking some time to decompress the spine after headstand practice to help prevent neck pain. She shows one way to do it. I used my FeetUp device instead, since I already have it. I just got into an assisted headstand on the FeetUp and hung out on it for about 30 sec., gently turning my head left and right, doing a few neck nods, and playing with my legs - at some point resting my feet on the wall next to the FeetUp. I did not feel any neck soreness for the rest of the day, or the following day. I don't know if the lack of soreness is due to neck muscles adapting to headstand training, or the decompression on the FeetUp prevented it - happy either way.

I feel like my hands/wrists are not ready for the headstand to Crow Pose transition. So for the next Practice A session, instead of working on transferring weight to the hands, I'm going to work on the 2nd progression from the StrongFirst article. The 1st progression was setup and balancing in headstand. 2nd progression is maintainng headstand while slowly extending one leg towards the sky then holding it straight.

Planche Mini Course Week 1

This week I was going to resume The Giant style training with single 20kg kettlebell. However, a couple of months ago, I strained something in the thumb side of my right forearm while carrying stuff to my car with an awkward grip. Holding a pitcher of water without support from the left hand was painful. Months later, holding the pitcher doesn't hurt as much, but when I clean a 20kg kettlebell, something about the action of pulling the KB on the upswing into the rack is still annoying for my right forearm.

So for this training block, I decided to try the Free Planche Mini Course taught by Eduardo Orihuela, a fitness coach who I first saw in GMB Fitness courses as a Lead GMB Trainer. Previously, I had thought of waiting until I can clean-and-press double 32kg kettlebells, which is close to my bodyweight, before taking Eduardo's planche mini course, which is really a course on planche push up training, not just planche. Planche push ups require both strength and skill to execute. I thought I would train primarily with KBs until when I'm able to clean+press double 32kg KBs, then try my luck with planche push ups, because rate of progress in terms of strength and muscle gains have been higher for me with The Giant style training than with pure bodyweight training. However, with my forearm problem eliminating The Giant style training as an option for now, I'm going with the planche mini course until my forearm feels better. It's designed to accommodate a wide variety of fitness levels - from those who are already strong, to those who can't even do one push up on the floor yet, so you don't have to be pressing double 32s before you can try it.

The mini course appears to be built on the GMB Method. Looking at the weekly schedule, I recognize the 5P's of the GMB Method - Prepare, Practice, Play, Push, and Ponder. Every day of the week has Prepare and Ponder. 2 days have Practice A and another 2 days have Practice B. There is one Play day, paired with Practice A. There is a Push day, also paired with Practice A.

I plan to do the Planche Mini Course until I feel that my right elbow can handle cleaning a 20kg KB again. This could be a few weeks or it could be months on end. Elbow tendons don't heal as fast as we would like.

5/11
Activity on this date was logged here.

MM Pike

5/12
Practice B - This is practicing a variation of GMB's Monkey locomotion in which we work on lengthening the legs as they leave the floor, working towards a cartwheel. The mini course has you working towards a handstand on the Practice A track. The cartwheel is how you would bail out of a handstand when you lose your balance. The journey to cartwheel itself develops attributes for better hand balancing. The planche is a hand balancing skill.

MM Bridge

5/13
MM Bridge - The couch stretch is annoying as always but I got my shoulder blade to touch the wall for both sides.
MM Horse Stance - I was unable complete 3 rounds. After 2 rounds I ran out of time. I'm not too worried because out of Master Mobility's 3 targetted positions, Horse Stance has the lowest priority for me.

5/14
Practice A - This time I decided to attempt a headstand on the floor instead of using the FeetUp device. I used two puzzle mat tiles as a cushion for my head. I tried setting the hands at various distances from my head to find a hand placement that would allow me to get into headstand without excessive effort. Once I found a decent hand placement, I worked on holding the headstand for time. My best time was 15 seconds. A few hours later, the back of my neck was sore. I think it's just because I hadn't made those neck muscles work in a while. Next time, I'll work on putting more of my weight on my hands. To progress to Crow Pose, my hands need to be able to support all of my bodywieght, so that I can lift my head.

Push - The mini course instructions is to work on push ups on the rings, if you are not strong enough to do push ups on parallettes, then practice push ups on parallettes. The next progression is to lean forward so that the shoulders are in front of the hands, and do push ups with this forward lean, until the shoulders are so far ahead of the hands, at the bottom of the push up, that the feet are floating. Once the feet are floating at the bottom of the push up, it's time to move on to the next progression, which is Eduardo's tuck planche push up negative to dip positive exercise. So for this day I did 6 sets of 3 push ups (no lean) on the parallettes. I did 3-rep sets because I could do 3 reps without feeling like I was training to failure. I narrowly avoided irritating my suspect left shoulder. Next week, I'm going to switch to ring dips with a 4kg plate, because ring dips feel less risky for my problematic left shoulder than parallette pushups. The purpose of a Push session in the mini course is to improve conditioning (and strength too I have to assume) to help us bridge the gap between planche progressions. I think ring dips will accomplish this goal just as well as parallette pushups. I plan to do unweighted ring dips for 4 weeks, which should be enough to get me back to where my ring dip performance was at the end of my last Easy Muscle training block this past March. Then I'll start using a dip belt with 4kg plate and work with that for up to 8 weeks. Then I may switch back to parallette pushups.

5/12
Practice B - Afterwards, did ring assisted pistol squats, then 3 broad jumps get in some leg work and warm up the hips for MM Horse Stance.
MM Horse Stance - Did 3 rounds this time.

I have a Bells of Steel green/average fabric resistance band that reportedly has 80 lbs. of resistance at full stretch. So, I hung it from my pullup bar, got it around my waist, then attempted to do a tuck planche on the parallettes. The band did not take away enough of my bodyweight to make this attempt easy. My shoulders, arms, etc. still had to work really hard. I don't think I got my hips as high as my shoulders, which would be a proper tuck planche. So for next week's Play session, I will still have to do Frogger on the floor, working towards being able to lean forward enough and hold the lean long enough to stall with my feet in the air. One recent trend in calisthenics is use of resistance bands to speed up progression towards a full planche, hence Eduardo's suggestion to try using a band after you have progressed beyond the Frogger play.

First Practice A session from Planche Mini Course

Today was my first session following the free Planche Mini Course taught by Eduardo Orihuela, a fitness coach who I first saw in GMB Fitness courses as a Lead GMB Trainer.

Practice A focuses on the Crow Pose. The first progression is working on a tripod headstand, which is the headstand with both palms on the floor, instead of with the forearms on the floor. The next progression is working on lifting the head out of the headstand into a Crow Pose.

The last time I attempted to work on a tripod headstand, I struggled to get my knees on top of my elbows or triceps, as shown in this video. I eventually made the typical mistake of putting my hands too close to my head, which resulted in falling over and straining my neck. Later I saw FeetUp trainers were on sale. I was intrigued by the idea of resuming headstand/inversion training with less stress on the neck, as promised by FeetUp advertising, so I ordered one. I could have just used a pair of yoga blocks to move some of the load away from the head to the shoulders, but I don't regret getting the FeetUp, as I've found it useful for butcher's block stretches as well.

The planche mini course teaches the headstand without a FeetUp, but it doesn't say you can't use one either. So I followed the instructions in the official video:



It was easy enough to park my my shoulders on the FeetUp cushion, with the head and neck in a comfortable position just like in the video. I then walked my feet towards my head, to raise my butt further into the air. Then I tried to lift a knee to my elbow but my leg or thigh was too short. I realized I would have to jump into the headstand, just like in the video. I attempted a few times to jump but failed. I then stood up, shook off the tension, and did a bit of walking and breathing to calm down. I then made a few more jumping attempts, and finally jumped into the headstand. I think fear of falling over from possibly jumping too aggressively was holding me back, even though I set up the FeetUp next to a wall. The wall would have stopped me from falling forward.

Once I got into the headstand, albeit with FeetUp assistance, I just took a few seconds to enjoy the sensation of being upside down with little effort, almost as if I were hanging with a string attached to my tailbone. When I first heard Killian in the FeetUp video above say relax your shoulders and arm, I was skeptical, but when I got into the headstand on the FeetUp myself, I really did feel the arms having to do little or no work. Most of my bodyweight was spread through the traps and shoulders that were in contact with the cushion. I spent the rest of the 10 minutes of Practice A playing with straightening one leg while keeping the other bent, then switching sides; then playin with shifting weight more towards the hands to try get more of the feel of a headstand with hands on the floor, and taking an occasional break.

After Practice A, the schedule prescribes a Play session. In the mini course, the progression of exercises in Play begins with Frogger. After we get comfortable with the basic Frogger, we switch to Slow Toe Pull Frogger. We work on leaning our shoulders further and further forward in relation to our hands, so that the feet get lighter and lighter. Eventually we will lean so far forward that we can pause with the feet in the air, demonstrating progress towards the Tuck Planche. Today I did 3 sets of 5 reps, and then my shoulders felt like enough work had been done. I was able to drag my feet for at least 3 seconds per rep. Next time I'll try turning out my palms more, to allow a greater lean. I didn't feel any strain on my wrists when I did Frogger reps with the palms straight, but I did feel there was a limit in how far my wrists would bend.

Planche and Tendon Strengthening

Dr. Yaad interview with Professor Keith Baar, one of the world’s leading researchers on how tendons, ligaments, and muscles adapt to training, nutrition, and hormones.



Among the Youtube comments, I found this summary of Baar's 10-min. protocol for tendon healing/strengthening

1. Recovering trainee: 30 sec hold + 2 mins rest, four times per session. 1-4 sessions 6 hours apart
2. Healthy trainee: 10 sec holds = 2 mins rest, once per day
3. Acutely injured trainee: See segment starting around 1:06 and see your doctor.

It's just a coincidence that Youtube put this video in my feed as I contemplate taking on Free Planche Mini Course by Eduardo Orihuela. I first saw him in GMB Fitness videos, demonstrating skills such as front lever, butterfly kick, planche, etc. Later he started offering his own fitness instructional material.

As part of my decision process of whether or not to go head with the planche mini course as my next training block, I tested a couple of exercises that are in the course to see if any would be painful. I did a planche lean for a few seconds on my parallettes. The elbows felt fine. Planche lean with hands on the floor also feels fine. I also did a couple of pushups on the parallettes. My suspect left shoulder felt some irritation. I then moved the parallettes closer together and tried again - this time the shoulder felt fine.

The interview reminded me of the collagen supplement I took when I experimented with stress relaxation tendon training last year. The mini course does not ask you to do planche leans or planche holds for time right away. The idea of taking the collagen supplement is to provide a supply for the tendon to grow, after being stimulated by isometric holds.

I do not expect training under this mini course to result in achieving the tuck planche this year, let alone a tuck planche pushup. I also do not expect any gain in muscle size, because I don't see anything in the program that would stimulate muscle growth. I do believe, however, that if I do the mini course for at least 6 weeks, I can achieve the crow pose, and be able to do each rep of the Frogger as slowly as 3 seconds. Most people start doing the Frogger with a hop of the feet because they're not strong enough to support their bodyweight on their hands for more than a second. As they get stronger, they can support their weight on their hands for more than a second, and start dragging their feet on the floor instead of hopping. I can currently take between 1-2 seconds to drag my feet on each Frogger rep. The mini course will have me work on dragging the feet more slowly, so that I'll eventually be able to pause for 1-2 seconds with the feet in the air - which would be a sign of progress towards the tuck planche.

IsoMax 6x6: Week 7 Log

5/4
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 178.4
Overhead Press 86.4
Drag Curl 155.4

MM Pike

5/5
MM Horse Stance
MM Bridge

Last week when I tried 1-arm bridge with the fingers of the supporting palm turned inward to allow my free arm and head to hang more, I felt some shoulder irritation. This time I focused more on pushing harder on the floor with the supporting arm. This eliminated the shoulder pain and improved stability..

5/6
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 179.2
Overhead Press 88.2
Drag Curl 172

5/7
MM Bridge
MM Horse Stance

I took a closer look at the Master Mobility Week 6 programming and realized I was supposed to do 3 rounds of all supersets. I was only doing 3 rounds of the 2nd Bridge superset. I did 2 rounds for all other supersets. So I'll repeat Week 6 next week.

5/6
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 179.2
Overhead Press 84
Drag Curl 166.6

MM Pike

I decided not to do a Week 6 of IsoMax 6x6. Perfomance in the 3 selected exercises has leveled off. 7 weeks is a good enough time to put into this training block. At the time I started this training block, I was hoping my right elbow would feel good enough to clean a 20kg kettlebell again. If so, then I'd do a training block of The Giant, either from the 3.x or 1.x series depending on the result of clean+press rep max testing. Unfortunately, the thumb side of my elbow still feels too sensitive

IsoMax 6x6: Week 6 Log

4/27
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 158.8
Overhead Press 97 PR!
Drag Curl 151.8

MM Pike


I've been focusing on getting more of a stretch in the chest before applying the minimum 61 lbs of force for Overhead Press. Today I felt my pecs firing harder than before. I hit a PR of 97 lbs. Week 5 of Master Mobility brought yet another selection of exercises to practice. I still like the Weeks 1-2 exercises the best for Pike, because they resulted in tangible progress in hamstring flexibility. I really like the Straddle Side Bend in particular and would like to see it again on the schedule. That said, I continue to trust the program.

4/28
MM Horse Stance
MM Bridge

The new Bridge exercises include the 1-arm Bridge, which GMB calls the 3-point Bridge. I've practiced this stretch on a somewhat regular basis. I was pleasantly surprised to be able to reach overhead more easily and with greather range than before.

4/29
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 206.4
Overhead Press 93.2
Drag Curl 163

MM Pike

After the IsoMax bar falsely reported 14 lbs. on my last Zercher Squat rep, I started looking at the max score on my 2nd to last rep, in case the bar malfunctioned again on the last. It happened again today. The max force on the 2nd to last rep was 206.4, which is a PR.

4/30
MM Horse Stance
MM Bridge

I had some time left over so I added a Pike superset. I didn't do the Week 5 Pike superset because I already did it on 4/27 and 4/29. I did the Week 2 superset instead - substituting elephant walk for bear walk - because I missed doing straddle side bend.

5/1
Last-rep max force (lbs):

Zercher Squat 177.6
Overhead Press 99
Drag Curl 159.8

MM Pike

I hit a PR again in the Overhead Press, this time 99 lbs. Because I hit 2 PRs in the same week, I decided it was time to raise the target load from 61 lbs. I didn't want to spend another session on 1-rep max retesting just to determine the new target load, so I chose 66 lbs. as the new load. If 95 lbs. is my new 1-rep max the new target load would be 66.5 lbs, which is 70% of 95. The IsoMax only allows whole number loads so I'll just go with 66 lbs. It's higher than 61 lbs. so it should be more than enough to stimulate higher force output. My Drag Curl performance seems to be trending up a bit as well, so I decided to raise the target load from 110 to 112.